New WebControl 8 board tolerates 70C use 5-40VDC supply

CAI_Support

Senior Member
From today, we officially ship hardware rev 2.3.x WC8 board with 3.3.19 firmware.
This board has been tested in temperature chamber for 70C operation, it can tolerate up to 85C during 5 minutes bake testing.
The new WC8 board has switcher IC to take from 5 to 40V DC power supply.  40VDC is absolute max voltage.
 
All functions and features are fully compatible with existing 2.2.2 board and 3.2.21 firmware. 
 
That's great news, a great improvement for the WC8.

Are there any new features other the the power supply improvement?

/tom
 
Tschmidt said:
Are there any new features other the the power supply improvement?
 
I2C and SPI are also now terminated on screw terminals are another major feature
 
CAI_Support said:
From today, we officially ship hardware rev 2.3.x WC8 board with 3.3.19 firmware.
This board has been tested in temperature chamber for 70C operation, it can tolerate up to 85C during 5 minutes bake testing.
The new WC8 board has switcher IC to take from 5 to 40V DC power supply.  40VDC is absolute max voltage.
 
All functions and features are fully compatible with existing 2.2.2 board and 3.2.21 firmware. 
I would buy that, if I would get access to the operating system installing µPython (http://micropython.org/) or lua (http://www.lua.org/ http://www.ethernut.de/en/firmware/nutlua.html).
 
This revision hardware add a special jumper J9, by default that is on, so that one spare pin is used to enable support for negative going relay boards.  If use a negative going relay board, please make sure also configure the TTL output to be reversed.
 
Do you know when an updated user manual will be available?

May want to make some other updates to the CAI website, there are at least two different WebControl pages that lead to
different versions of the documentation.

Clicking on the Manual link pops an old 2011 PDF user manual, click on support the newest manual is dated 2013
http://www.cainetworks.com/products/webcontrol/webcontrol-faq.html

Clicking on PLC manual takes you to what looks like an up to date list of documentation. Clicking support takes you to the same
2013 list as the link above.
http://www.cainetworks.com/products/webcontrol/index.html

/tom
 
Tom,
 
Thanks for pointing out.  I will let responsible person know.
As far as PLC functions, 3.03.19 firmware is identical with 3.02.21 for the 2.2.2 hw rev board.  Please let us know any question you may have on the use of this new board.
 
CAI_Support said:
As far as PLC functions, 3.03.19 firmware is identical with 3.02.21 for the 2.2.2 hw rev board.
Please let us know any question you may have on the use of this new board.
From this thread it appears there are new connectors and jumpers.
Be nice to have pretty pictures of the new PCB and an updated manual even though the FW has not changed.

/tom
 
Tom, that is true. It does have connectors dedicated for SPI and I2C bus, as well as spare pin and LED connectors.  Even for 2.2.2 board, PLC firmware can control the LED, but it does not have anyway to directly output LED voltage.  This new revision hardware does provide that.  We should get that done ASAP.
 
Tom,
 
We have updated pictures on the web site, also voltage requirement on web page.  We will need to get updated user guide for WC8.
Thanks for your inputs!
 
To work with low cost 0V trigger relay boards like this one:
 

http://www.amazon.com/JBtek-Channel-Relay-Arduino-Raspberry/dp/B00KTELP3I

The output configuration must be set to inverse,  please make sure J9 is closed.  During power up, relay will not turn on.
In PLC, it can be triggered normally by set OPx to 1.
 
In our test, the 5V relay board is powered by the WC8 5V terminal from this 2.3.x hw rev board, and it was working fine during our tests.  However, we still recommend to have separate power for relay board to avoid any interference.
 
Back
Top